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I've been in performance playing Jazz Piano in my little jazz trio and someone has requested Mustang Sally.

I played it for them.
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Perhaps that's what you are really complaning about, dunno, but I can tell you that a performer can make a better living by responding to whomever their audience happens to be at the time.


--Mac



Many years agoI was in a jazz band and someone came up and asked for Patsy Cline's "Crazy" (written by Willie Nelson). The piano player refused and did it with an attitude that alienated the customer. 'Tis a shame. The chords to "Crazy" are not bad at all, better than a lot of jazz tunes, the melody is no more simplistic than a number of jazz tunes, and we would have done it our way. But the guy let his attitude get in the way.

In contrast, back in the 1970s I was in a disco trio playing a small lounge in Miami. Somebody asked for "Night Train" which is hardly a disco song. We played it and he gave each of us 3 $20 bills. Not bad for 5 minutes work, and $60 back they was worth what about $250 is today. Besides, I like "Night Train" it's a nice little blues number written by Jimmy Forrest who I think was in Duke Ellington's band at the time.

If they ask, and if I can, I play it.

If they ask, and I cannot, I complement them on their choice (even if I don't care for the song) and apologize. If I know something close, I'll try that.

If enough people ask for something I don't know how to play, and it is something we can cover, we'll learn it.

If you stand on stage long enough, the public will let you know what they want to hear.

And all of it is much better than climbing telephone polls, making sales calls, solving someone else's computer problems, doing someone else's taxes, driving a truck, removing a gall bladder, working in a retail store, managing employees who might not really want to work, or any of the other things people in the real world do for a living.

And not having to work when you are making the money to pay the mortgage is what I call living.

Notes

Bob "Notes" Norton smile Norton Music
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